hnau's random reading 2014/15

Over the past years, I've compiled a list of books that I'd like to read one day, mostly in the realm of speculative fiction. Essentially, I've ordered 25 titles at the same time, from used book stores on two continents. Now they are sitting on my shelf, most still in their packaging, and I'm in the happy process of reading them in the order of arrival.

EDIT: This will take some time, as I'm also reading some non-fiction stuff in parallel.

1. The Lives of Tao / The Deaths of Tao / The Rebirths of Tao by Wesley Chu
2. The Near Witch by Victoria Schwab
3. The Pattern Scars by Caitlin Sweet
4. Ingathering: The Complete People Stories by Zenna Henderson
5. Maul by Tricia Sullivan
6. The Last Queen by C. W. Gortner
— The Color of Magic by Terry Pratchett
7. Cold Magic / Cold Fire / Cold Steel by Kate Elliott
— Gunnerkrigg Court by Tom Sidell (online)
— There's a Fine Line by Teresa Joyce
8. The Magicians and Mrs. Quent / The House on Durrow Street / The Master of Heathcrest Hall by Galen Beckett
— The Silence of Medair / Voice of the Lost by Andrea K. Höst
9. In the Land of Blue Burqas by Kate MacCord
10. Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict / Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict by Laurie Viera Rigler
11. The Space Eater by David Langford
12. The Flower Reader by Elizabeth Loupas
13. She Is Not Invisible by Marcus Sedgwick
14. So Yesterday by Scott Westerfeld
15. Once a Witch / Always a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough
16. Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen
— Etiquette & Espionage / Curtsies & Conspiracies / Waistcoats & Weaponry / Manners & Mutiny by Gail Carriger
17. Goblin Moon / The Gnome's Engine by Teresa Edgerton
18. Shadowed Summer by Saundra Mitchell
19. The Summer Country / The Winter Oak by James A. Hetley
20. The Window by Jeanette Ingold
21. Madame Zee by Pearl Luke
22. Above by Isla Morley
23. Calculating God by Robert J. Sawyer
24. The Unhandsome Prince by John Moore
25. The Maze Game by Diana Reed Slattery

Oh sounds like fun! Keep us posted.

1. The Lives of Tao by Wesley Chu



Ironically, the first book was a last minute addition to the list. This review was involved.

Roen is an obese programmer, unhappy with his life, when he is unexpectedly joined by a symbiont. Now he must learn martial arts in order to save the world from the symbiont's fellow aliens. Lots of history is reinterpreted, and there are lots of witty remarks. Nitpick: Being a software developer, I would have liked seeing Roen use his professional expertise, too.

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Looking forward to this.

Thanks. I'm already at book 5 now, so expect a few more posts in the next days.

2. The Near Witch by Victoria Schwab



I picked this book for the author's voices, conveying a dark atmosphere for the night, and a light one for the day.

Some kind of a Piper of Hamelin story. Children are disappearing. It might be connected to a strange boy on the moor, or some atrocity the village commited long ago. Lexie, a teenager, must find the children before her little sister will disappear, too.

The magical system resembles fairy tales - witches can do certain things, there are no real explanations given. Instead, the focus of the book is more on personal interaction.

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@hnau good luck with the plan. I will be interested in your comments and progress.

Nice project!

3. The Pattern Scars by Caitlin Sweet



Blindsight by Peter Watts had a great impact on me, because it introduced me to neuroscience. Especially the long bibliography in the online edition was very helpful. So, when Watts married Caitlin Sweet, I got interested in her works.

The Pattern Scars is a dark story, bordering on horror. Nola, a young seer, gets trapped in a plot of murder and intrigue. Quite an intense read.

The magical system involves seeing (and even manipulating) possible futures of a person. A nice twist: it is considered too dangerous to look at your own future.

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>9 hnau: I like the sound of The pattern scars! Book bullet...

4. Ingathering: The Complete People Stories by Zenna Henderson



The People stories were mentioned in Among Others by Jo Walton.

Well, imagine reading a book about aliens, and then noticing some strange, at least extra-continental flies crawling on your arms or on the pages. There were four or five of them, as far as I can tell, waiting somewhere in the book to be released one at a time. These poor, half-starved things were shipped from Colorado to continental Europe, and had me slightly worried about the book being infested. But they are all gone now, probably still travelling with the Deutsche Bundesbahn.

The People are human looking aliens with a set of gifts that seem to defy conventional physics. Their ship crashed on Earth, and only small, scattered groups and individuals survived. They are friendly but strange, and after some witch hunts they have learned to hide their abilities and to just blend in. Now, a such a group tries to find other survivors.

This is classic science fiction, the first stories being published in the 1950s, so it's not as fast paced as many modern works. I found it to be some kind of a comfort book, deeply resonating with my current trains of thought.

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>11 hnau:

Certainly an SF classic.

5. Maul by Tricia Sullivan



Two worlds, mysteriously connected. There's the world of Sun and her girl gang, shopping for cosmetics, until—well, read it yourself. And there's the world of Meniscus, a male human clone used for medical research, in a feminist society where the most of the male population was killed by a plague.

The mystery got me hooked, and I've even read some chapters twice to find more clues. (Because of EFL, I tend to overlook some subtleties anyway, even more so when a chapter is written in Femalese. KrayZglu is the soe-eyed one, right?) It's Bonus Gift Day at Estée Lauder.

Procreation is a recurring theme in this book, e.g. the evolutionary benefits of sex. Non-FYOS.

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#11 by @hnau> I read The People stories eons ago. They are fun, aren't they? I have Among Others in the TBR and plan to get to it in 2015.

14 @majkia

Among Others was one of those rare book where I couldn't decide on a rating. It's like that dish of lentils I ate years ago at a small Indian restaurant. I could not even start to categorize the taste. Lentils cooked with curry and butter and decorated with lemongrass. Now, years later, I'd like to try it again and I suspect that I'd like it.

Tooth and Claw and the Farthing series are on my radar, perhaps I'll put them on my wishlist for Chrismas next year.

6. The Last Queen by C. W. Gortner



Historical fiction about Juana of Castile (1479-1555): A teenage girl, betrothed to a noble of a foreign country she's never met. A mother, torn between loyalty to her husband and to her home country. A queen, but not yet a ruler.

This book shows all the ramifications of intrigue and political marriage in the middle ages, from the POV of the daughter of a queen in a world of male rulers.

The Wikipedia article and the author's afterword both shed additional light on some of her actions and on her personality traits (spoiler warning).

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Interlude: The Color of Magic by Terry Pratchett



This book was waiting on my TBR shelf for some time.

Funny and satirical, but shallow. Rincewind the wizard and Twoflower the tourist survive more or less random challenges. The world is full of magic, but even for a wizard, using magic takes a lot of effort.

     The author uses magic to conjure up absurd situations (pun indented).

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7. Cold Magic by Kate Elliott



This post made me curious about Kate Elliott.

It took a few chapters to get used to the pacing of this book, but then I was hooked. Alternate history set in the 1800s, during an ice age, and with magic. 19-year old Catherine is living with her cousin Beatrice and her parents, when suddenly a mage arrives and demands to marry her on the spot. A rather cold fellow, in manners as well as in temperature.

The magical system involves cold and hot magic, where the kind of magic a person has influences the temperature around him. There is a parallel spirit world. And there are several myths regarding the Wild Hunt, dreaming dragons, and the unseen courts. This is the first book of a trilogy, and it is not yet clear how all of this is connected.

It took a few chapters to get into the story, and it is just as hard to get out of it. I'm definitely going to read the rest of the series.

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>18 hnau: I've been vaguely aware of this series and curious to try Kate Elliott... you have now given me enough to go on that I've got to take the hit, acknowledge the book bullet and get it on Mount TBR for next year.

Alternate history! Ice Age! Female protagonist! The Wild Hunt! Dragons! Faerie! How have I not read this already? :)

>19 imyril:

The same bullet got me! A tofer!

Well, we do not (or at least not knowingly) meet any faerie in the first volume. Catherine is rather ignorant in these matters, and she simply can't tell the species of some of the people she meets. (But she recognizes a North American troll.)

>21 hnau: I'll Take trolls and a hint of faerie for later ;)

>22 imyril: / >20 suitable1:

May I point you to another delicious time waste? Gunnerkrigg Court by Tom Siddell features two female protagonists, a trickster god, fairies, robots, ghosts, shadows — and beautiful art (especially on the later pages). Available online at www.gunnerkrigg.com.

Warning: Highly addictive, more than 1400 pages, with 3 new pages published every week.

>23 hnau: Taking deliberate pot shots? Now that's just wicked.

I'm absolutely not... already on chapter 3. Hmmm :)

Oh yeah, loved Gunnerkrigg Court, but I fell away from it and haven't returned for so long I'm hopelessly behind. I rather prefer to have it in book form (bought the first two volumes for my daughter) rather than on the web, just as I prefer to watch a whole season of shows in a sitting on Netflix or Amazon Prime. My life and schedule are too crazy to keep up with those sorts of things.

>25 MrsLee: Btw, Tom is doing a comic retrospective on YouTube. And Amazon is taking pre-orders for Volume 5 now, to be released in June.

:)

>18 hnau:, >19 imyril:, >20 suitable1: I loved the whole Spiritwalker trilogy, although I did find the pacing in book 2 became excessively slow. But things pick up again in book 3, and the ending is very strong.

>24 imyril: The problem with recommending addictive comics is that you might suffer a relapse. I went on an archive binge myself — only the last 700+ pages, and I could have stopped any time :-)

>28 Sakerfalcon: Got the other two books of the trilogy for Christmas, and loved both of them. Book 2 is less self-contained than book 1, and I was glad I could continue reading right away.

I have also finished another interlude: There's a Fine Line by Teresa Joyce.



An account of sexual abuse. Teresa was married, mother of a son, and working as a teacher, when her stepfather asked her to work at his company. With all of her family being financially dependent on him, he soon started to stalk, blackmail and threaten. Had to stop reading a few times. It is hard to rate such a book, but I will give 5 stars for authenticity alone.

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>20 suitable1: Make it a three-fer!

My kids are all faithful Gunnerkrigg Court readers--they'll be delighted to hear Book 5 is coming out!

>30 Marissa_Doyle: et al

According to LT, I already have this book. Now to find it. Although I am wondering if this one that should have been added as a wish book; I certainly don't remember it. (Like that's never happened before!)

8. The Magicians and Mrs. Quent by Galen Beckett



This book was mentioned in several threads in FantasyFans as well as in the Green Dragon. Who wouldn't like a heroine with a habit of reading while walking? And not only for fun, but to gain knowledge, to solve a problem only she is willing to solve!

The story is told from 3 POVs: Ivy is looking for a way to cure her mentally ill father. Rafferdy is working very hard on being pleasantly disinterested in anything. And Eldyn is trying to find his way after his father's death.

This is an austenesque comedy of manners. Social norms dictate distance between people who otherwise might be friends or even more. (Now I finally understand some peculiarities of today's British culture.) This distance also extends to the reader. That is, until the middle part, where we finally get to know Ivy's innermost thoughts.

The magical system involves legends about Gods and planets, living woods, spells and illusions. Magical talents seem to be hereditary, but not genetically dominant.

To me, this book feels more like a prologue to the rest of the trilogy. Starting book two now...

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>32 hnau: I really liked that series. Well, I liked 2/3 of it, because I very quickly started to dislike Eldyn. Hope you'll like the sequels!

 


Mount TBR.

That looks intriguing. I could never leave books in an envelope. I always have to open the envelope at the earliest opportunity.

>33 zjakkelien: I agree, Eldyn is the least likable of the main characters, but I somehow got used to him in The House on Durrow Street. I'll have to read the last book for my final verdict on him.

>35 pgmcc: Same here, but that's part of the experiment...

Interlude: The Silence of Medair and Voice of the Lost by Andrea K. Höst

 

Medair an Rynstar has finally obtained the weapon to fight back the invaders. But she is late. What seemed to her like yesterday, it had happended long ago. The war is over. Her people and the hated invaders, they have found together, have loved and married for generations. 500 years have passed.

What is she going to do with that weapon? Can she find her place in this society, the wounds of her soul still fresh, her hate still raging?

What I like about the magical system is, that magic is just like any other talent. You might have little talent or much, you might have little or much training, and you are certainly exhausted after difficult spells. Mages can do all sorst of things, like wend whispers (magical SMS) or shielding. Anyone can use magical artifacts, e.g. a ring for animal control. Using wild magic, on the other hand, is very dangerous: there is nearly unlimited power, but also incredible danger: you might literally destroy the world.

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The silence of Medair sounds good. Interesting storyline! It went on my wishlist...

37, 38> The Silence of Medair seems to have just jumped onto my wishlist as well!

Voice of the Lost has two plot twist I didn't like at first. Then I realized that, besides being foreshadowed in the first volume, they both serve to further explore the subjects of the book, without being a Zaunpfahl. That's a rare gem, even in speculative fiction, and I'm glad the story went that way.

9. In the Land of Blue Burqas by Kate MacCord



One of the few non-fiction books in the experiment.

Hellspark by Janet Kagan has introduced me to the concept of culture, that Silent Language we all speak without knowing, those subconscious assumptions we call “logical” or “obvious” or “natural” but cannot really explain. We are blind to our own culture. When we explore another culture, we learn way more about our own. Anthropology and speculative fiction have this in common: by exploring strange and foreign ideas, at the same time we broaden our horizon, and we learn more about ourselves.

Kate McCord has lived in Afghanistan for five years, working for a NGO. But this book is not about providing training and humanitarian aid. Her work is only the background for a more personal journey, learning the language and the culture. As a foreign, female, single, non-muslim project manager she had to find and invent the rules that apply to her in Afghan society, where something like this simply does not exist, where all women marry at age 11 to 19.

Wearing a scarf, but not a burqa. The complicated rules of sitting apart from men in public transportation. Social interactions. Explaining herself without giving offense. She has to be deliberate in what she does and what she says. She describes her actions as well as the cultural implications: “I didn't look directly at either man. That would be rude.” Living as a foreigner in a gender-segregated society, she has access to both worlds, the public space dominated by men, and the private area of women.

I'm not going to discuss religion here, but Afghan culture is very much intertwined with religion, and even our own, mostly secular western culture was shaped by religion for hundreds of years. (Remember, we are blind to our own culture.) Talking about religion might not be appropriate for us in many contexts, including this group, but in Afghanistan, it certainly is.

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>33 zjakkelien: / >36 hnau:

I've enjoyed The Master of Heathcrest Hall more than the other books in the trilogy, and even Eldyn became more likable.

Looking back on the series, one of the main themes seems to be the question: When a state or organisation slowly turns rotten, when is the time to leave, or even to join the enemy? We have three longish books full of people doing this, sometimes with rather unhealthy results.

Of course, the time is different for everyone. Some might be able to work toward reforms for a long time, while others have already lost dear friends or family members to the gallows. So: how do you think of those who have already switched sides? Do you fight them? Or can you still be friends?

10. Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict / Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict by Laurie Viera Rigler

 

Jane Austen meets chick lit. And time travel.

Confessions: Courtney, who used to live in today's Los Angeles, wakes up in the body of Jane, somewhere in England, about 200 years earlier. Being thrown into the world of her favorite author (guess who?), she has to learn the social norms of the time, and sort out the new life she has inherited, including suitors.

Awakenings: Meanwhile, in another time, Jane finds herself in Courtney's appartment, without servants, but with lots of strange devices. Fortunately, she's a quick learner, unlike Catweazle.

A fun introduction to Victorian culture and it's not so obvious side effects. Now I feel compelled to watch the Pride and Prejudice reruns on TV...

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11. The Space Eater by David Langford



The Space Eater was mentioned in Bring the Main Drive on-line!, and I wanted to learn more about this strange FTL drive.

The stars go nova. And it's our fault.

A soldier and a telepathic communicator are sent to warn a colony on another planet. All they have to do is squeeze through a 1.9 cm hole. Seems easy compared to dealing with all the military personnel on both sides.

The magical system technological advances allow long distance matter transfer, nullbombs, resurrection of the dead and telepathic transmission of pain.

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12. The Flower Reader by Elizabeth Loupas



Rinette is a floromancer at the queen's court. On her deathbed, the queen entrusts her with a mysterious silver casket, to be given to the heiress to the throne. Live, death, and court intrigue intevene, and things get complicated. A murder is to be solved. And suddenly, everybody wants to have that casket.

Magical system: Rinette hears the flowers in the garden speak to her, but their predictions are rather vague. She can sense a person's character as a corresponding flower. Her predictions generally come true, but might still be explained away as psychological phenomena.

By the way, this is also a historical romance, and the new queen is Mary Stewart.

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13. She Is Not Invisible by Marcus Sedgwick



16-year old Laureth (yet another chemical name) searches for her missing father. He was expected to travel somewhere in Europe, but now his notebook has been found in New York, with lots of notes about the nature of coincidences. Convinced that something sinister is going on, she "abducts" her little brother and flies to the US: a blind detective looking for a needle in a big apple.

Is there a magical system? Well, there are strange coincidences. And there's a talent to brick electronic devices.

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>46 hnau: I like your brief summaries.

And there's a talent to brick electronic devices.

I don't understand this sentence. Is something missing?

>47 Meredy:

The talent is somehow related to that of Alcatraz Smedry, only limited to electronics.

A broken phone is called bricked, because essentially, it is just an expensive brick now. "The term derives from the vaguely cuboid shape of many electronic devices (and their detachable power supplies) and the suggestion that the device can function only as a lifeless, square object or paperweight."

>48 hnau: Hm, ok, thanks. I never heard that before (or maybe I thought I was hearing "break").

Yes, the term seems to be rather new, and it's mostly used by folks with an affinity to game consoles and smartphones. The first time I've seen it was probably in 2011, by a Sony lawyer, of all people.

14. So Yesterday by Scott Westerfeld



17-year old Hunter works as a trend scout, his friend Jennifer is a trend innovator. Searching for Mandy, their missing boss, they find a cache of counterfeit shoes, much better than the originals, both in design and in quality.

The perfect shoes. These criminals are not just product counterfeiters, they are also tricksters bent on disrupting the market.

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15. Once a Witch / Always a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough

 

Tamsin comes from a family of witches. It was prophesized that she would be one of the most powerful, but her talent has never appeared. Others might be able to change the weather, to teleport or to read the mysterious book of the family history. Tamsin is utterly normal.

One day, while helping out in the family bookshop, a customer asks her to find a lost clock. Eager to prove herself, she enlists the help of Gabriel, another outsider of the commune, and travels to the past to retrieve the object. But time travel can have unforeseen side effects.

Magical system: besides the talents, there is ritual magic by invoking the elements and/or blood, usually practiced on Samhain.

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16. Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen



Sarah Addison Allen is a LibraryThing Author, and I've discovered the book that way. I like author's voice and the subtle, benevolent magic.

The Waverley family is known for their talents and their magical garden. Claire, for example, has a catering service famous for her mood-changing edible flowers. Evanelle's little gifts are always useful later on. And the apple tree in the garden likes to throw apples at everyone.

Claire lives alone in the old family home, but that is going to change. There's a new neighbor moving in. Claire's sister is coming home with her daughter, fleeing from an abusive relationship. Old friends and aquaintances are showing up.

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Sarah Addison Allen has been one of my best LibraryThing discoveries.

Ditto

Sounds interesting. I like the idea of that apple tree...

Interlude: Etiquette & Espionage / Curtsies & Conspiracies by Gail Carriger

 

Sophronia Timminick is a rather ... active girl. After accidentally custardizing a visitor, her parents send her to Mme. Geraldines's, a finnishing school floating above Dartmoor. Sophronia soon starts to wonder what she is really being trained to be: assassin or spy?

These often hilarious books are set in a steampunk world with werewolves and vampires.

I will definitely buy the rest of the series.

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>57 hnau: I read these recently too and absolutely loved them. Sophronia is a great heroine and I liked that all her friends, while very different, are also awesome. Can't wait for book 4 to be published.

17. Goblin Moon / The Gnome's Engine by Teresa Edgerton

 

A strange world, with humans, gnomes, trolls, goblins and half-elves, and a delightful mixture of English, German and Scandinavian names.

The story follows
• Caleb and Gottfried, two old hobby alchemists;
• Sera, Gottfried's granddaughter, and Elsie, her sickly cousin;
• Jed, Caleb's grandnephew;
• the duchess of Zar-Wildungen, Elsie's godmother;
• and several other characters, including possible future husbands for Elsie and Sera.

The chapters are episodic, and it takes some time until we see where the story is heading. There's that coffin with the books and the well-preserved body. There's Jed finding new work with the glassmakers. There's the vigilante rescuing a prostitute. There are the quacks trying to cure Elsie.

I've interrupted reading the books several times, sometimes to read another book in between. But I've always returned, and it was worth it.

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18. Shadowed Summer by Saundra Mitchell



Iris and Colette are roleplaying scary stories in the cemetery, when a real ghost shows up. Only Iris can see and hear this boy who vanished decades ago. Now they must solve the mystery of his disappearance.

I'm a bit uncomfortable with reading about real-life occult practices, like ouija boards and seances (and I would not want my children to try such things), but I liked the implications of mixing playacting and real communication.

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19. The Summer Country / The Winter Oak by James A. Hetley

 

Maureen is already diagnosed with schizophrenia, and possibly suffers from PTSD, when she is attacked by a man with supernatural abilities.

In both books, we meet the villians early on and learn aubout their schemes, e.g. using the heroes for procreation. I hated that moment, but I'm glad I continued reading: there is much more going on.

Magical sytem: Magical talent is hereditary. The kind of magic you can do is related to your interests. Travel between worlds takes only a few steps.

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20. The Window by Jeanette Ingold



Mandy has lost her mother and her eyesight in an accident. Now she is moving in with relatives she never knew of. In her new room, leaning out of the window, she can actually see into the past.

Magical system: there is no magic besides the Window. Rather, it is a plot device to explore and learn from the past. Mandy is a strong girl, willing to tackle any obstacles she meets, to create and promote friendship and family.

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21. Madame Zee by Pearl Luke



Historical fiction. Not much is known about Mabel Rowbotham a.k.a. Madame Zee, mistress and right hand of the Brother, XII, the leader of a spiritualist colony in Canada. This is the (mostly fictional) story of her life.

While she is often portrayed as a brutal enforcer, the author paints a more nuanced picture, from visions of her dead sister to trying to protect the followers from their increasingly erratic leader.

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22. Above by Isla Morley



Time travel, the hard way, at a speed of 24h/d. Blythe is kidnapped as a teenager, and raises a child in captivity, until they finally manage to escape to the Near Future.

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>63 hnau: I don't know anything about the real-life story behind Madame Zee but it sounds fascinating. I think I've been sorely wounded by that book bullet!

23. Calculating God by Robert J. Sawyer



First contact: An alien walks into a museum and says, "Excuse me. I would like to see a paleontologist."

Calculating God is an introduction to the evolution vs. intelligent design debate, as Sophie's World is to philosophy. Nitpick: I would have liked to see an intelligent proponent of creationism. It is too convenient to discard a dumb one. After all, creationists believe because of incarnation. What is the God of this story going to tell about origins?

Now I'm going to put The Lost World of Genesis One on my wishlist.

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24. The Unhandsome Prince by John Moore



Caroline has spent several weeks in the swamp, kissing frogs, until she finally found the prince. Unfortunately, he is not as handsome as promised. Will she marry him anyway, or will she sue the late witch's daughter for compensation?

The magical system allows any popular fairy tale magic, but usually with a twist.

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25. The Maze Game by Diana Reed Slattery



Found on a list of constructed languages. Glide is a graphical language, spoken using gestures, written as glyphs, or danced in a maze of symbols.

It is a complex world, where immortality is only a virus infection away, where matter transfer provides nearly unlimited resources. We meet an AI bound by conflicting contracts, hundreds of years old immortals, and mortal teenagers, training to dance and die beautifully in a few year's time.

We follow several characters, each masterly showing us other aspects of the world. Finishing the book was like waking up from a vivid dream where everything made sense, bewildered.

The author provides background information in her next book, Xenolinguistics: Psychedelics, Language, and the Evolution of Consciousness, and on YouTube.

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Looking back, I declare the experiment a success. Not knowing which book came next provided a pleasant surprise each time I started a new one. Reading them strictly in order also helped to actually read all of them: no need for a ROOT challenge, at least for this fraction of the library. I plan to do it again.

My favorite books of this thread, for completely different reasons: